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THat happened to me with Monty Python and the Holy Grail. I am surrounded by some people at school who love that movie and never stop quoting it, to the point of ruining the movie, and when I watched it, I found it mildly amusing, but rather more silly and boring than anything else.

I'm supposed to watch Warm Bodies on Sunday. I realized after suggesting it that it's a romcom but it's the only other movie out there right now that I would want to watch. Unless you guys have any better suggestions.

Not sure if this deserves its own thread or not. But Craig Clevenger and Six Finger Films are getting closer to releasing "Smoke and Mirrors." A while ago they did a kickstarter campaign for this. I'm super stoked that it's close to being released.

I am not obsessed with Monty Puthon like some British people are (my best friend was annoyingly obsessed through high school) but I thought the films were funny.

I think it's okay but I've definitely been turned off it by so many people quoting whole sketches obsessively and annoyingly my whole life. Films are alright, I guess. I don't know it just hasn't ever really made me laugh.

In April 2011, Hailee Steinfeld was said to be in talks for the lead role as Juliet in this new adaptation.[6] Due to Steinfeld's young age, there was some concern she would be asked to appear nude in the film. Director Carlo Carlei explained "there was a lovemaking scene that included nudity for the married Romeo and Juliet. This script was written with a 20-year-old actress in mind. As soon as Hailee Steinfeld was cast, all nudity and lovemaking have been excised from the script. It will be romantic and age-appropriate for a 14-year-old."[7] Julian Fellowes added, "We did feel it would be nice to have romantic, married love, and that purity was an important part of the film. They don’t make love until they have been married."[1]

Gawddammit. Hailee Steinfeld's an awesome actress. But now it's because of her that the movie will be particularly stupid, with the only sensuality involved being what the MPAA thinks is a 14 year old's idea of puppy love (as if 14 year olds aren't obsessed with sex).

I got reminded of Blue Valentine and rewatched some scenes and I love that movie so much. It makes me really emotional, haha.

We watched that movie. Neither the wife or I thought it was super great or anything. We did take note of how real the arguments were as they sounded like some alcohol fueled arguments we used to have. It was an ok movie.

Last night we watched An Education and I thought it was very overrated. Lots of the parts that were meant to be charming were creepy and the resolution was so bloody easy. Typical trite from BBC Films.

Falling Down, that movie where Michael Douglas plays a crazy white guy who goes crazy and bes white in everyone's grill, grill-seeking the people at the local Macdonalds cause they won't give him breakfast and such. I've seen this a few times before, as a kid, but it never occurred to me until now how racist it is at the beginning.

He is an island, in being white; surrounded by blacks and Mexicans, and there's all these unflattering closeups of the people around him. I'm talking about the tension building scene where he's stuck in traffic and his neck is sweaty and there's a fly buzzing around him and the AC won't work and everyone is honking--we're really looking at a bunch of disgusting animals, and here our main character who we're supposed to sympathize with is the great white hope, this well dressed, sensible man among the chaos of urban America.

Then, when we're introduced to Robert Duvall's character, he plays Smart Cop to a Chinese guy's Stupid Cop--Chinese guy being the cop that scoffs at any mention of crime, as if a crime has never been committed before and the very thought of it is silly. I was half ready to consider this the most racist movie ever, until about halfway through when that design starts to appear intentional; we meet the army surplus store worker, an actual racist, and Michael Douglas shuts down his racist blather by politely disagreeing with him, telling him that in America you should respect the opinions of others, and then, when met with hostility, Mc D sticks a butterfly knife in the fucker's shoulder.

"What were you gonna do?"

"I don't know what I was gonna do."

"Guys like you never know what they're gonna do. You were gonna kill your wife, your little girl. Then it would be too late to go back and you would turn the gun on yourself."

"I'm the bad guy? How did that happen?"

Yes, Michael Douglas, you are the bad guy. Which is the question that made me want to watch the movie again. I could never figure out, as a kid, whether or not his actions were meant to be portrayed as being just, or if we were watching an insane person whose actions could be justified only to the point where we could sympathize with him.

Characters in 90s dramas do not usually have much depth, they aren't usually complex, and neither are the plots. In the 90s, especially where Michael Douglas is concerned, plots are most often spoon fed to you, and very little is left to the imagination.

What's weird about this movie is that it follows almost every trend of the 90s, and yet it makes an antihero of the cookie cutter character that would continue in cinema for the rest of the decade. Movies like Air Force One, The Game, Ransom--we always have the well dressed white man. He works, he has a family, he's a nice guy, and when confronted with some evil he has to take matters into his own hands. This character is the reason we say, "Don't anybody be a hero!" when we make bank robbery scenes in the decade to follow; Michael Douglas, Kurt Russel, Mel Gibson-this guy who is the same guy, our white family man, he is the couch fantasy of every man in the world who thinks that if he had to, if he absolutely had to, then he could, he would--that if someone messed with their family, that dormant animal would rise and they would suddenly become an action hero without muscles or sunglasses.

Except here, instead of taking our white man, victimizing his family, and having him go up against all odds to save the day, we have the exact same character played by the exact same actor over the same backdrop, the same phony side actors (as was trend in the 90s, as if to make the well-paid actors look better), the same coca-cola advertisement, the same everything, and the only difference being that here, the man, in all his righteousness, has snapped. The movie doesn't ask what a man would do if his family were threatened, but it asks what a man would do if he just had one bad day after another and decided he couldn't take it anymore--that same white man, whose family serves no purpose in customary plots of that time but to be objects of his revenge, is in this movie the enemy, illuminating the truth of the self obsessed white man cliche of the 90s: It isn't about the family, it's about revenge, nor is there substance in anything but the white fatherfigure character; from the one dimensional villains (Mexicans avec gats) to the wife whose only scenes align with beginning/middle/end at happysmile/cry/happysmile, and whose children exist only to be threatened or to rejoice in being saved, while by necessity the law must be useless.

The trope died--could never survive in this day and age, when your average viewer knows more about film, can judge acting, soundwork, plot structure, etc, better than your average 90s producer. Why? The easiest thing to do is to die for someone; the thing people can't do, which warrants divorce, is live for someone; but every knucklehead in a throe of passion can think of only that to say: "If someone harmed you, I would..." and so on, an objectification devoid of meaning beyond the innate animal urge to hoard and protect one's possessions.

But he has a propensity for violence?

Yeah, I think you could say that.

Did he strike the little girl?

No.

Did he strike you?

Not exactly.

Not exactly?

You know, there were times when I thought he was going to, but I just didn't want to wait until he got around to it.
It's hard to explain. He could, I think.

You think?

And yet it isn't sexist, either, anymore than it's racist. It's fantasy for spineless white men; masturbatory fodder for people who talk to the mirror a la Houlden Caulfield, telling it what they didn't say to who the words were meant for; of course his wife is ditzy, of course she is mean hearted and keeps him from his daughter, while Robert Duvall's wife is a controlling and maniupulative dragon, and of course the Korean grocer is greedy, and the Mexicans are all gat wielding gangbangers straight out of Colors where Robert Duvall plays the same character. Not racist, not sexist, just very narrow minded, and afterall, I don't think Falling Down is even aware of itself; it's the exact same thing that would fill the theaters throughout the 90s, the only difference is that it chooses a different fantasy: that of the stressed out, hard working consumer, and his rebellion against the system that, in reality, favors him. And while the white man is made to appear a victim of society, even the movie itself is marketed to him, not out of favor for a minority but because that's who, in the 90s, movies were marketed for, debunking its message with even its own existence.

Then I watched Lonely Hearts and The Pledge--both were better, neither were as interesting.

Last night we watched An Education and I thought it was very overrated. Lots of the parts that were meant to be charming were creepy and the resolution was so bloody easy. Typical trite from BBC Films.

I can't stand that movie. My mom seemed to like An Education but it really irritated me.

In my opinion, the best film adaptation of Les Misérables (the novel), is the one directed by Robert Hossein and starring Lino Ventura.
It has two versions : a "short" one for theatres and a long one shown in four parts on french TV in the early 1980s.

I remember having nightmares after seeing it at the movies (the Fantine scenes are particularly disturbing). Very dark and gritty.

I'll have to keep an eye out for that one. It's got that great late 70's-early 80's grit to it that automatically makes it feel haunting.
The best one I've seen was the one from the early '30's, felt like it would fit right in with the Draculas and Frankensteins from the same period. Again, the Fantine scenes were standouts as horrific.

I wish they'd called it something else because it sounds super cheesey, like a remake of the movie Mobsters with Christian Slater, which came out when I was in high school. I don't know anything about Gangster Squad, though.

Every time i hear or see the name, I keep thinking it's a cheesy re-make of The Monster Squad!

Falling Down, that movie where Michael Douglas plays a crazy white guy who goes crazy and bes white in everyone's grill, grill-seeking the people at the local Macdonalds cause they won't give him breakfast and such. I've seen this a few times before, as a kid, but it never occurred to me until now how racist it is at the beginning.

He is an island, in being white; surrounded by blacks and Mexicans, and there's all these unflattering closeups of the people around him. I'm talking about the tension building scene where he's stuck in traffic and his neck is sweaty and there's a fly buzzing around him and the AC won't work and everyone is honking--we're really looking at a bunch of disgusting animals, and here our main character who we're supposed to sympathize with is the great white hope, this well dressed, sensible man among the chaos of urban America.

Then, when we're introduced to Robert Duvall's character, he plays Smart Cop to a Chinese guy's Stupid Cop--Chinese guy being the cop that scoffs at any mention of crime, as if a crime has never been committed before and the very thought of it is silly. I was half ready to consider this the most racist movie ever, until about halfway through when that design starts to appear intentional; we meet the army surplus store worker, an actual racist, and Michael Douglas shuts down his racist blather by politely disagreeing with him, telling him that in America you should respect the opinions of others, and then, when met with hostility, Mc D sticks a butterfly knife in the fucker's shoulder.

"What were you gonna do?"

"I don't know what I was gonna do."

"Guys like you never know what they're gonna do. You were gonna kill your wife, your little girl. Then it would be too late to go back and you would turn the gun on yourself."

"I'm the bad guy? How did that happen?"

Yes, Michael Douglas, you are the bad guy. Which is the question that made me want to watch the movie again. I could never figure out, as a kid, whether or not his actions were meant to be portrayed as being just, or if we were watching an insane person whose actions could be justified only to the point where we could sympathize with him.

Characters in 90s dramas do not usually have much depth, they aren't usually complex, and neither are the plots. In the 90s, especially where Michael Douglas is concerned, plots are most often spoon fed to you, and very little is left to the imagination.

What's weird about this movie is that it follows almost every trend of the 90s, and yet it makes an antihero of the cookie cutter character that would continue in cinema for the rest of the decade. Movies like Air Force One, The Game, Ransom--we always have the well dressed white man. He works, he has a family, he's a nice guy, and when confronted with some evil he has to take matters into his own hands. This character is the reason we say, "Don't anybody be a hero!" when we make bank robbery scenes in the decade to follow; Michael Douglas, Kurt Russel, Mel Gibson-this guy who is the same guy, our white family man, he is the couch fantasy of every man in the world who thinks that if he had to, if he absolutely had to, then he could, he would--that if someone messed with their family, that dormant animal would rise and they would suddenly become an action hero without muscles or sunglasses.

Except here, instead of taking our white man, victimizing his family, and having him go up against all odds to save the day, we have the exact same character played by the exact same actor over the same backdrop, the same phony side actors (as was trend in the 90s, as if to make the well-paid actors look better), the same coca-cola advertisement, the same everything, and the only difference being that here, the man, in all his righteousness, has snapped. The movie doesn't ask what a man would do if his family were threatened, but it asks what a man would do if he just had one bad day after another and decided he couldn't take it anymore--that same white man, whose family serves no purpose in customary plots of that time but to be objects of his revenge, is in this movie the enemy, illuminating the truth of the self obsessed white man cliche of the 90s: It isn't about the family, it's about revenge, nor is there substance in anything but the white fatherfigure character; from the one dimensional villains (Mexicans avec gats) to the wife whose only scenes align with beginning/middle/end at happysmile/cry/happysmile, and whose children exist only to be threatened or to rejoice in being saved, while by necessity the law must be useless.

The trope died--could never survive in this day and age, when your average viewer knows more about film, can judge acting, soundwork, plot structure, etc, better than your average 90s producer. Why? The easiest thing to do is to die for someone; the thing people can't do, which warrants divorce, is live for someone; but every knucklehead in a throe of passion can think of only that to say: "If someone harmed you, I would..." and so on, an objectification devoid of meaning beyond the innate animal urge to hoard and protect one's possessions.

But he has a propensity for violence?

Yeah, I think you could say that.

Did he strike the little girl?

No.

Did he strike you?

Not exactly.

Not exactly?

You know, there were times when I thought he was going to, but I just didn't want to wait until he got around to it.
It's hard to explain. He could, I think.

You think?

And yet it isn't sexist, either, anymore than it's racist. It's fantasy for spineless white men; masturbatory fodder for people who talk to the mirror a la Houlden Caulfield, telling it what they didn't say to who the words were meant for; of course his wife is ditzy, of course she is mean hearted and keeps him from his daughter, while Robert Duvall's wife is a controlling and maniupulative dragon, and of course the Korean grocer is greedy, and the Mexicans are all gat wielding gangbangers straight out of Colors where Robert Duvall plays the same character. Not racist, not sexist, just very narrow minded, and afterall, I don't think Falling Down is even aware of itself; it's the exact same thing that would fill the theaters throughout the 90s, the only difference is that it chooses a different fantasy: that of the stressed out, hard working consumer, and his rebellion against the system that, in reality, favors him. And while the white man is made to appear a victim of society, even the movie itself is marketed to him, not out of favor for a minority but because that's who, in the 90s, movies were marketed for, debunking its message with even its own existence.

Then I watched Lonely Hearts and The Pledge--both were better, neither were as interesting.

I can go along with all of that except the bit about Michael Douglas being some great white hope anti-hero we're supposed to sympathize with. Sure, he's doling out all these beatings on every imaginable 90's cliche, but, for me, that's what makes him unsympathetic. He's crossed that line that none of us would ever cross, whether it be cowardice or sanity that holds us back. They might as well as had on of the Independence Day aliens running around shooting up burger joints.

Watched Panic Room again the other day. That movie doesn't seem to get the glory that Fincher's other movies get, but it's pretty damn incredible the way it just keeps building and building suspense for a relatively simple story.

You know what else is awesome? Reviving dead topics from 3 pages ago, that's what!
Re: piracy. It's not really the right term for it, but I think we're stuck with it because everyone that's for downloading movies and whatnot thinks it sounds cool, and everyone against it thinks it makes it sound sinister. If it was really piracy, there'd need to be a sense that all these people downloading movies are then taking them to sell and make a profit on.

What it really is, would be a form of shoplifting. Which is still wrong no matter how you slice it; but Shoplifting just isn't as "grabby."

Also, it doesn't help when Hollywood comes out and says how they keep increasing profits year after year. Doubly so. On one hand, someone pirating will see that and justify themselves and on the other hand, those profits are jumping because of all the movies that are padding their ticket sales with gimmicks like Imax and 3-D.

Little known fact: Russian kids "pirating" Beatles albums back in the '60s and '70s greatly influenced the culture and helped move things in place for the fall of the Soviet Union.

Oh how many things were smuggled into the country when we were under Communism... Recording music from Radio Free Europe (which they could get you in prison for listening to), bringing stuff when someone you knew (it was never you) came back from abroad etc. It was awfully hard, but it worked sometimes.

As for downloading movies, I get it, I watch it, I delete it. No distribution. For books, on the other hand, I make exceptions. And I've even shared ebooks I've paid for, so there. I'm a good Samaritan :D

Here's a special sneak preview of some of them.
I still need to edit some down and I've already replaced a few of them with better movies, but it's fun to watch nonetheless. How many can YOU recognize?!

Man, I wish you'd used YOU COOKED HER NINES from the Man with Two Brains.

I'm not being picky, though. :)

None of those are set in stone. I've already changed #50. I got a bunch of movies that had multiple numbers, so if I find a better one, I can slide it in and shuffle things around.
Plus, I still got no idea what to put at 1 yet. Highlander just seems way too obvious.

I think the only ones I really, really want to keep are 15, 12 and 7. I'm proud of those, like, arrogantly proud!

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